There is something magical about a country hall. These small wooden buildings dot the landscape. They have a frugal modesty and an old fashioned generosity. If they had names they’d be called Thelma or Rose or Alan. They’re a pungent olfactory mix of last week’s wedding enmeshed with yesterday’s committee meeting. Curry and Jatz, tea and beer, tears and laughter.

Insufficient funding and guidance from the State Government is inhibiting Byron Council's attempt to effectively manage its famous but fragile coastline, a Council report has revealed.

Council fees for construction and development in Byron were the equivalent of paying $160 for a coffee, making it ‘entirely unviable’ to invest here, industry representatives told the Council last week.

Here’s another reason for millennials to be marching on the street. We found out last week that on census day 2021, 15 per cent of the dwellings in the Byron Shire were unoccupied (2,348 places to be precise). That figure was 30 per cent in Byron Bay itself, three times the national average.